Family decries justice system after reduced murder plea

Updated 10:02 pm, Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Four years after Marcos Sanders, 20, was gunned down in what authorities described as a drug deal gone awry, irate members of his family stood up in court Wednesday to address his killer.

But in an unusual twist on the typical victim impact statement, the family's anger focused on the justice system itself — specifically, the judge, defense attorney and district attorney's office — as much as defendant Matthew Gabriel Garcia, who agreed to a 15-year sentence for a reduced charge of manslaughter.

“I'm ashamed of you, Your Honor,” stepmother Carol Sanders said after state District Judge Lori Valenzuela approved the plea agreement. “What are you thinking?”

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She and others said they wanted to see a trial or at least have input on the plea agreement process. They were incensed that Garcia, 24, was not convicted of murder.

“This is not justice for the family,” Sanders said. “If you were some poor schlep on the East Side, you'd do your time.”

As is standard, the judge, defendant and attorneys remained silent during the victim impact statements. Defense attorney Mark Stevens declined comment after the hearing.

The victim's family was “always very resistant to hearing the evidence,” prosecutor Miguel Najera later noted. Contentions that Sanders was in essence an innocent bystander — coerced into driving his friends to a drug deal only because he had a car — don't match the physical evidence, he said.

Sanders was found shot to death in his vehicle in February 2009 at the Braesview Apartments, where Garcia allegedly was selling Xanax, a prescription drug often sold on the black market for nonprescription purposes.

Two friends who were with Sanders ran from the scene but were apprehended at a nearby Mexican restaurant. The men, who never were charged with a crime, told authorities it was Sanders' idea to beat up Garcia and rob him instead of paying for the drugs. They were shot at after they knocked Garcia to the ground and drove away, they said.

Garcia claimed self-defense in his statement to authorities, accusing the trio of shooting at him as well. One of Sanders' friends had gunshot residue on both hands, police noted.

“We rarely give 15 years, but I really think obtaining a guilty verdict from a jury would have been impossible,” Najera said of the plea. “Everybody wants to believe that their child can do no wrong. But as prosecutors, we're stuck with the evidence we have.”